Snow/Ice and then Brake Squeal

I've never had a problem with squealing brakes on my 2010 GT-R. I'm using stock rotors and pads and am at about 11K miles. My front pads are getting a bit thin from a visual inspection but not close to metal on metal or anything. It snowed and got cold/nasty around Christmas day and my brakes started squeeling afterwards. I think a few times they rusted overnight and when I first moved the car they kind of "broke" loose abruptly.

Any ideas on why I might be getting brake squeal all of a sudden now? It only happens under medium braking, not very light or very hard braking and it doesn't make any noise when off the brakes completely but it's very annoying during normal street driving. Do I need to re-bed in the pads? Also does the GT-R wear brake pads evenly inside and outside? I'm going to pull the wheel off after work, maybe the inside pad is dead?

yeah it comes and goes just do some 70-10mph stops on the interstate late one night and you should be good for a while. cant say for how long but usually after some hard braking heating them up it tends to slack off for a while at least in my experience

the rusting thing is a pain and i always feel like im going to crack the pads when mine pop free

Thanks! Do you think the squeal is the result of leftover rust on the rotor? From looking at it there looks like there might be some light deposits of material or rust on the rotor face. I'll try a bed in process to see if I can burn it off. BTW I washed my car thinking the extra brake dust was causing the problem and it did go away for about a day and then came right back.

If the brake pads need replacement and have hit the pin that makes noise you would hear it all the time not just when you brake, correct?

Ok so I pulled the wheel off and took a look at the pads. They are thin but don't appear to be too thin in my opinion to be causing this problem. I'd guess they are a tad thinner than the back plates that they are on. I also noticed that all the cross drill holes were clogged with brake pads so I punched them all back out with a screw driver. Still have a tad of squeal this morning. Any other ideas?

The lining (friction material) is also acting as a heat insulator & vibration damper in addition to proving friction as its prime purpose. The squeaking you described has someting to do with the volume of the lining wihch has been consumed (worn out) to a level that it starts to lose its dampling effect and as weather gets colder the volume is further shrinked thereby make the sqeuaking more noticeable.

The rust or clogging of rotor drill holes should have nothing to do with it, rather I belive by replacing a new pad the squeking should go away.

Thanks, I've never had this happen with other cars. Generally the brake pads will wear to the metal prong that squeals when it tells you to change the pad but never squeal just from pad material to rotor contact. Does RB have a street pad that can be tracked occasionally? (hybrid of ET and XT series)

Thanks, I've never had this happen with other cars. Generally the brake pads will wear to the metal prong that squeals when it tells you to change the pad but never squeal just from pad material to rotor contact. Does RB have a street pad that can be tracked occasionally? (hybrid of ET and XT series)

Each car uses different brake components, as an example GTR pads (same as CTS-V & MB C63 in shape) is one of the largest ones - 190mm in length and 65mm in height (FMSI called it thickness), which is about or more than double of a normal pad used in other vehicles, and it's therefore more prone to vibration, squeaking or uneven wear than a smaller pad due to the larger area has less margin for error in matting between pad and rotor.

GTR Brake Pad (Front)

Nissan 300ZX / Subaru WRX Brake Pad (Front)

Compare GTR to 300ZX stock pads = 12167/5062 or GTR is 2.4 times larger in friction area than Nissan300ZX.

Our XT910 is formulated for spirited & aggressive street driving with reserve for light tracking - No squeaking, very low dust with excellent modulation. The only difference with street ET series is it may not have as good initial bite in very cold weather but once it's warming up (after a few stops), it will be just as good as ET.

So I pulled the pads out and I still have about 5mm of material so it's not because they are thin. I went ahead and sanded the pads down with some rough sandpaper to bring out some fresh material and bedded them in again and the squealing went away.